Lady Lancaster was pleased to be very gracious indeed to her returned nephew.

"Ah, you are as big and handsome as ever, Clive!" she said, "and well, of course. I believe you never were sick in your life?"

"Hardly ever," he replied, with a laugh, adding, with veiled anxiety: "I hear that you have killed the fatted calf in my honor, Aunt Lydia. Whom have you staying with you?"

"A few nice people from London, Clive—twenty in all, I think. There are old Lord and Lady Brierly, and their son and daughter, Sir Charles Winton, Colonel Livingston, Mark Dean and his pretty sister, the Earl of Eastwood and his beautiful daughter, Lady Adela, the Cliffords, and some other people. You will meet them all at dinner. I think you know them all?"

"Yes, I suppose so," he answered, rather absently.

"To-night there will be a little informal dance—the young folks were so eager for it, you know. And, Clive, that young friend of yours, Lieutenant De Vere—I hope you brought him down with you?"

"I did not," he replied.

"I am sorry; but I shall send him a note to-morrow. Did you have a fair trip over, Clive?"

"Very fair," he replied, in a peculiar tone.

"I am glad to hear that. Oh, by the way, Clive, did you bring that child to the housekeeper?"

"Yes," he replied, and a slight smile twitched the corners of the mustached lips.

"I hope she wasn't troublesome," said the haughty old lady, carelessly.

"She was troublesome—I suppose all of the female sex are," he answered, lightly.

"Well, it couldn't be helped, or I would not have bothered you. I had to send for the young one, or West would have gone off herself to fetch her. I'm glad you brought her. The trouble is all over now, so I suppose you don't care."

"Oh, no!" said Captain Lancaster, with rather grim pleasantry.

And then she touched him on the arm and said, significantly:

"There's some one here I want very much for you to meet, Clive."

"Ah, is there?" he said, shrinking a little from the look and the tone. "I thought you wanted me to meet them all."

"I do; but there is one in particular. It is a lady, Clive," she said, giving him a significant smile that he thought hideous.

He tried gently to wrench himself away from her.

"Well, I must go and take my siesta and dress before I meet them," he said.

"Wait a minute, Clive. I must speak to you," she said, in a tone that savored of authority.

"Will not some other time do as well?" he inquired, glancing rather ungallantly at his watch.

"No time like the present," she answered, resolutely. "You are trying to put me off again, Clive; but beware how you trifle with me, my Lord Lancaster, or I shall know how to punish you," she said, shaking her skinny, diamond-ringed finger at him.

His handsome face flushed haughtily.

"Go on, madame," he said, with a slight, mocking bow. "I am the slave of your pleasure."

She regarded the handsome, insubordinate face in dead silence a minute.

"You already anticipate what I would say," she said. "Why is the idea so distasteful to you, Clive? Any young man in your position might be transported with joy at the thought of inheriting my fortune."

He bowed silently.

"You know," she went on, coolly, "you can never come home to live on your ancestral acres unless you marry money or inherit it."

"Thanks to the folly of my predecessors," he said, bitterly.

"Never mind your predecessors, Clive. There is a woman here whom I want you to marry. Win her and make her mistress of Lancaster Park, and my fortune is yours."

"Am I to have her for the asking?" he inquired, with a delicate sarcasm.

"It is very likely you may," she answered. "Handsome faces like yours make fools of most women."

"And who is the lady it is to charm in this case?" he inquired, with bitter brevity.

"It is the Lady Adela Eastwood," she replied, concisely.

He gave a low whistle of incredulity.

"The Lady Adela Eastwood—the daughter of a hundred earls!" he cried. "Your ambition soars high, Aunt Lydia."

"Not too high," she replied, shaking her old head proudly, until the great red jewels in her ears flashed like drops of blood.